When I opened the door, I saw two uniformed officers and my son David, who rushed forward and grabbed me as I began backing up, screaming, “No! No!”
But David, sobbing, told me the news: “Mom. . . Jimmy’s dead.” Over my screams I heard one of the officers say, “Mrs. Howard, we regret to inform you your son is dead.” That’s the last thing I remember, but I understand David, all one hundred and fifteen pounds of him, carried me upstairs to my bedroom. Five days later the plane arrived carrying Jimmy’s body, escorted by my son Corky.
Though I prayed to die, I knew I had to live for David and Corky. But I had one request: “When Jimmy’s letter comes, I want it.” They told me there would be no more letters, but I was adamant there would be. Jimmy’s funeral was on Tuesday and his letter arrived on Saturday. In it, he gave me instructions like “Don’t get behind in your washing and ironing; you know that’s your downfall. And promise you’ll take a vacation now and then. You know you’re not made of iron.” He also said, “I know Christmas will be there before you know it. Please don’t be sad because I won’t be there in person. Remember I’ll always be with you in spirit.”
Thirty days later I still had not left my bedroom and had done nothing but cry and read and reread Jimmy’s last letter. It was the first time I had been alone. Again, I was reading his letter just to see his handwriting. Suddenly he was beside me on the bed, dressed in his stay-pressed pants, V-neck sweater and open-neck shirt, the clothes he usually wore to school. He looked so sad. “Mom,” he said, “I’ve been trying to get through to you, but I can’t. Read the last chapter before the book of Ecclesiastes.” I screamed, “Jimmy!” and reached to touch him, but he was gone.
At that moment Corky walked in. I told him Jimmy had been there. He said, “Now, Mom . . .” But I assured him I wasn’t crazy and then told him what Jimmy had said to me. Corky got the Bible and turned to the last chapter of Proverbs. It told about Lemuel, King of Massa, and how his mother taught him advice about life. It went on to tell about the rareness of a capable, intelligent and virtuous woman. “She is far more precious than fine jewels. . . . her children rise up and call her blessed. . . . many daughters have done virtuously, nobly and well, but you excel them all.” I knew Jimmy had spoken to me through those words. He knew the Bible, but except for Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, I didn’t. I couldn’t have told you there was a book of Ecclesiastes in the Bible and he knew that. And he knew Corky would know.
Jimmy could never stand to see me cry or hurt in any way and he knew I was literally grieving myself to death. In my heart I believe that God allowed him to return for just those few seconds to share words that would help me to live.
When my sons went to Vietnam, I had prayed so hard for their safe return. But when Jimmy was killed, I turned away. One minute I would say I didn’t want to hear God’s name, but in the next I’d be praying for strength. . . . which, through His Grace, I received. The first time I went back to church, I was late and the minister was already into his sermon. . . . The text that day was the last chapter of Proverbs.
Thank you, Lord.
Jan Howard
Deck of Cards
It was during the Vietnam conflict when a bunch of soldiers had been on a long hike. They arrived in a town called Saigon, and the next day being Sunday, several of the boys went to church. After the chaplain read the prayer, the text was taken out. Those of the boys that had prayer books took them out; but one boy had a deck of cards, so he spread them out.
The sergeant in charge of the boys saw the cards, and after the service the soldier was taken prisoner and brought before the provost marshal. The marshal asked, “Sergeant, why have you brought this man here?”
“For playing cards in church, sir.”
“And what do you have to say for yourself, son?”
“Much, sir,” the soldier replied.
The marshal said, “I hope so. If not, I shall punish you severely.”
“You see, I’ve been on the march for six days and I had neither a Bible or a prayer book; but I hope to satisfy you with the purity of my intentions.
“You see, when I look at the ace, it reminds me that there is one God. When I see the deuce, it reminds me that the Bible is divided into two parts—the Old and New Testaments. And when I see the three, I think of the Father, Son and the Holy Ghost. When I see the four, I think of the four evangelists who preached the gospel; that was Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. And when I see the five, it reminds me of the five wise virgins who trimmed their lamps. There was ten of them—five were wise and were saved; five were foolish and they were shut out. When I see the six, it reminds me that in six days, God made heaven and earth. And when I see the seven, it reminds me that on the seventh day God rests. When I see the eight, I think of the eight righteous persons God saved when he destroyed the earth. There was Noah and his wife, their three sons and three wives. And when I see the nine, I think of the leper our Savior cleansed. When I think of ten, I think of ten heavenly saints, and when I see the king, it reminds me again that there is but one King of Heaven. And when I think of the queen, I think of the blessed Virgin Mary, who is Queen of Heaven, and the jack reminds me of the devil.
“When I count the number of spots on the deck, I find 365—the number of days in the year. There are fifty-two cards—the number of weeks in the year. There are thirteen tricks—the number of weeks in a quarter. There are four suits—the number of weeks in a month. There are twelve picture cards—the number of months in a year.
“So you see, sir, my deck of cards served me as a Bible, almanac and prayer book.”
Friends, this story is true. . . . because my son was that soldier.
T. Texas Tyler
“DECK OF CARDS”
Written by T. Texas Tyler.
Copyright ©1948 Songs of PolyGram International, Inc.
Trio Music Company, Inc., and Fort Knox Music, Inc.
Copyright Renewed.
Used By Permission. All Rights Reserved.
Promises Kept
Events that would forever change the lives of two young brothers started when John was twelve and Malcolm was eleven. At the time, they were visiting their grandmother’s farm in Goodlettsville, Tennessee. Though the boys were supposed to go to church that morning, they had decided to go crow hunting instead, so they stayed home with their aunt and uncle.
As the boys prepared to go hunting, they loaded the rifle, set it in a corner of the living room and filled their canteens. Because they weren’t allowed to go after crows ’til their aunt and uncle left for church, the boys got to feeling their oats and started roughhousing. Before long, Malcolm—who had forgotten that the gun was loaded— picked it up and began pointing it around the room. John shouted, “Don’t point that thing at me—it’s loaded!”
“No, it’s not,” Malcolm said as he squeezed the trigger.
But it was. The rifle went off and a bullet hit John in the side of the head, penetrating several inches into his brain. The saving grace was that he had on earmuffs fitted with a thin steel band that clamped the muffs to his head. That metal band split the. 22 cartridge into several pieces so the bullet didn’t go as deep as it would have if it had been whole. Yet the fragments crushed the entire side of John’s skull and went into the brain.
Seconds after the shot rang out, John hit the floor yelling, “You shot me!” He fell with his head next to the bed so all that could be seen was blood trickling onto the rug. Malcolm thought for sure that his brother was going to die. Their aunt heard the shot and came running. She knelt down, took a close look at John, got up and ran out into the yard, where her husband was fixing to go to church. They put John into their car and took him over to the funeral home for transfer to an ambulance. From the funeral home, the boys’ aunt and uncle went with the ambulance to the hospital. All this time, Malcolm was left alone at the house. That was the first time he had ever prayed in earnest.
“Dear Lord,” he said, “Let my brother live. Let him live, and
I’ll become a preacher.” Up until that moment, he had never even thought of being a preacher!
On the way to the hospital, John began praying in earnest also. Over and over again, as he felt the blood oozing from his head, he said, “Dear Lord, let me live and I’ll become a doctor.”
When John got to St. Thomas Hospital, the brain surgeon told his parents, who had arrived by that time, that the damage was severe enough that, while the boy might live, he would probably be a vegetable—unable to walk, or talk, or do anything for himself for the rest of his life.
Later on when Malcolm got to the hospital, he was told the same awful news about his brother. Overcome with remorse, Malcolm was left alone in a small room with only his thoughts for company. That was when the Lord spoke to him. (It was the first and last time he ever had this experience in his entire life.) God told him, “John is going to be alright. Don’t worry about it.”
It wasn’t long at all before John got strong enough to go back home—but he still couldn’t talk. By then it was summer. The house didn’t have air conditioning, so the windows were kept open most of the time. One afternoon, the family was sitting in the kitchen, not far from John’s room, when all of a sudden they heard someone going, “Ugh, ugh.” They rushed into the bedroom and discovered that a wasp had gotten under John’s blanket. It was then that John decided he would talk.
Doc McClure thought John’s recovery was such a miracle that he got doctors from all over the area to come and look at the boy and check his X rays to confirm this miraculous recovery.
Did the boys keep their promises to God? While Malcolm did become a preacher, the fact is he tried everything he could to get out of it.
After high school, he attended Martin College. He was sitting in his dormitory room one Friday evening when the district superintendent walked in and said, “Someone told me you want to be a preacher; is that right?”
Now Malcolm didn’t remember telling anybody he wanted to be a preacher—in fact, he was certain he hadn’t breathed a word to anyone! “Yeah . . . yeah, I guess that would be nice,” was his less than enthusiastic response.
“Well, that’s great because we got a little circuit down here in Wayne County, Tennessee, that doesn’t have a preacher. . . . They will be looking for you this Sunday.”
As it turned out, those Wayne County folks may not have wanted a preacher. But then, Malcolm was the nearest thing to nothing they could have found. So they sent him to the largest circuit in the state, where he started pastoring six churches. In 1957, Malcolm got his license to preach, later attended Vanderbilt Seminary and has enjoyed pastoring ever since.
Now what about John, his brother? He not only recovered, he became an all-’round athlete. He played football, basketball, track and more. He graduated as valedictorian of his high school class with the highest grade point average in Marshall County, Tennessee— 98.9. After that, John entered the Sewanee University, where he finished his premed studies in three years. He later became a board-certified radiologist and went on to achieve the rank of colonel in the U.S. Air Force. Today, John is a partner of the Rush Medical Clinic in Meridian, Mississippi.
Now you may be wondering how I’ve come to know so much about these two boys. That’s not hard to explain— Dr. John Patton is my brother.
Reverend Malcolm Patton
Too Broken to Be Fixed
The people in my family believed if something went wrong, it was always someone else’s fault. I readily picked up this attitude and ran with it. Actually, when you think about it, it’s not a bad plan. I was not responsible for any of my failures; they were always someone else’s fault. Holding on to this thought, I was able to feel anger toward the “responsible parties,” rather than feeling inadequate myself.
Of course, one of the side effects of this attitude is simple: You never get very far in life. You never learn from your mistakes because, after all, they weren’t your mistakes. Or perhaps the “responsible parties” hurt you on purpose, so the anger builds over the years to the point where the smoldering rage is, at best, kept just under the surface.
Finally you ask yourself the question, Why are so many people out to get me? and the only logical answer is that even God hates you. So if you were like me, you return the favor and hate God right back. My belief that God hated me grew as the years passed, and I perceived each setback as further evidence that my belief was correct. I had heard it said that God works through people. Seeing the number of people out to get me, I knew this was true.
Even as a child, I learned to fight back, so it is not surprising that as an adult, I gradually fell deeper and deeper into a violent lifestyle. I became very good at hurting people, yet strangely, I always hated myself for it afterward, especially if I hurt someone I cared about. Gradually I learned to stay away from anyone that I cared about, and I became a loner. I knew that all I could do with any consistency was hurt people, so I tried to keep it down to hurting only strangers.
My life continued along these lines for nearly forty years, and as my inner rage grew, so did the incidences of people going out of their way to cause me grief. I was thirty-nine, working in a wood shop building custom furniture, and I was very good at it. One weekend day while driving down a street in Kansas City, I noticed a man carrying an antique Queen Anne chair to a Dumpster in an apartment complex. I could see that the chair had a broken rung, a problem I could easily fix. That chair was worth money—something I desperately needed—so I quickly turned into the complex and stopped my car beside the Dumpster. As the man approached I asked, “If you’re going to throw that away, may I have it?”
“No,” he replied as he smashed it over the side of the Dumpster. I watched in disbelief as the old wood shattered on impact. Too stunned to even reply, I drove off.
What a complete and total low life, I thought to myself, he did n’t want it, but he would rather destroy it than give it to someone who could fix it and use it. Once again, I had more evidence that God was out to get me by working through other people.
Finally, about a year later, I had suffered all I could stand. There was no fight left in me; I couldn’t go on. I was tired, tired of struggling to get up only to be knocked back down again, tired of failing, tired of fighting against the world, tired of living.
Although I still had a strong fear of death, that fear was overpowered by my fear of life. That was my situation on the cold winter day that was supposed to be the last day of my life. I drove my car down along the Missouri River just outside Kansas City, parked and walked downstream. My plan was simple; I wore a heavy winter coat that would aid the frigid, rushing water in pulling me under. Knowing that I was a coward, and that once I hit the water I would probably chicken out, I walked far from my car so I would stand a better chance of freezing to death before I could make it back. I was serious, deadly serious. I found a place where I could easily climb down to the water’s edge; I stood for a moment looking at the ice chunks floating past. There was no hesitation, merely a moment to take one last look around before letting myself fall into the river. My life was nearly over, and I felt a sense of relief.
Then suddenly, unbidden, the memory of that man with the chair at the Dumpster flooded through my mind. I was looking at the rushing river which was about to relieve me of the burden of life, yet what I was seeing was the chair smashing into a thousand splinters. Then a voice came from my own imagination, or from right beside me; I can not swear which. It said, “If you’re going to throw that away, may I have it?” and I knew that it was the voice of God. In a millisecond my mind flooded with thoughts of the man I had been all my life, the people I had hurt, the destruction that lay behind me. Yet at that moment, I knew beyond all doubt that God loved me, not because of what I had done, but in spite of what I had done. Not because of who I am, but because of who God is . . . unconditional love.
I fell to my knees and cried tears of shame, pain and joy. At that moment I knew that I wanted to give my life to God. At the time I had no idea how I wo
uld do it, but I knew that if God could fix me and use me, I would not be like the man with the chair at the Dumpster.
On that cold wintry day on the bank of the Missouri River, circumstances caused me to become willing. As it turned out, all I had to do to give my life to God was become willing. Willing to listen to inner guidance, willing to do whatever God puts in front of me, willing to trust that God will not give me a task beyond my abilities, willing to accept that God is more concerned about my welfare than I am, willing to recognize that everything I thought I knew could be wrong, willing to see the truth . . . even when it hurts. Willing to try to let go of my hate, so my hands are free to grasp love. And even when I fall short on all other counts, I need to be willing to become willing, and to understand, from the depths of my being, that there is nothing I can do to keep the love of God from man.
Victor Fried
Goin’ Fishin’
For years, Uncle Mike and I fished the little lake near home every chance we got. As we grew older, though, our families and work became more and more important while the fishing trips got fewer and farther between. One unforgettable weekend, Uncle Mike and I did manage to find time for a fishing tournament—by default, mind you—our wives were on a church retreat and we men were home alone.
The first day of the event was a Saturday. Fishing conditions couldn’t have been better—cool water, a light breeze and just a touch of cloud cover. We spent the whole time catching and releasing fish too small to keep—a typical day of fishing for both of us. When we decided to pack it in, the final tally was just three fish—seven pounds total. On the second day, the weather wasn’t quite as friendly. The wind blew so bad we allowed ourselves to drift into a large cove for shelter. There, we strung a long line between two trees so we could steady our boat before the start of a relaxing day of drowning worms.
Chicken Soup for the Country Soul Page 11
